An Unconventional Home

By Maria Jose De La Cruz

I don’t know where I am from.

I was born in a place unknown to me,

People ask me where I am from,

And I have to think hard.

Where Am I from?

Here?

No.

There are no papers that show the U.S. is my Home

But this is not my only Home.

I ignored Celaya, Guanajuato Mexico because it was foreign to me

        But here too I am considered a

foreigner.

There is no trace of me in my

birthplace;

My home came with me to the United States in small New Braunfels, Texas.

My home is where I have people that love me,

Where there’s laugher ,

Where loud lively music plays. 

My home is where I feel safe and welcome.

When my friends make me tea with love,

When my love covers me with an extra blanket because I get cold too easily,

That is when I know I am home.

Home is not a place I can show you on the map.

For a long time that made me feel out of place and foreign.

It was the colonizers who made my people erase the fluidity of home

No longer could home be anywhere your loved ones where.

Society tries to designate a Home and a family for me 

But for a queer immigrant, home is wherever you need to go to survive.

There is no concept of borders or walls for us 

We make our home where we need to because it is our only option.

With the few resources we have and resilience in our blood

A  precious home is created. 

This Land was not meant to be owned by humans

Like land, water is owned by the universe and must be shared.

Home is what you make it

And for me home is everything.